I
want to start off by apologizing for letting things slide with the Pupping Out
Project since this past summer. I had hoped and intended to launch a new series
of interviews with interested pups and handlers that could be shared with the
community, an initiative that will span several months and hopefully get a lot
of personal stories out there. At first
I was kind of embarrassed that I’d let things slide so much. Yes, real-life
needs and circumstances demanded a lot of time and attention. Still, though, I
felt like I was failing in something that’s actually very important to me. And,
in that light, I wasn’t sure how to re-ignite it.
But, then, I realized that something was happening that is actually very
prevalent to what the Pupping Out Project was created for: sharing our
experiences so that they might help someone else out there. This isn’t a “coming
out of the kennel” experience. I’ve shared my own story on that already.
However, it is one I know I’m not alone in experiencing; a difficulty that I’ve
personally heard other pups talk about.
I had lost that feeling of connection to my inner pup. I don’t know how or when
it began to happen. Likely, I never will. Somehow though, I started to become
afraid of going to that place within where once I needed no coaxing at all to
reach. It was only through a storm of change that I even began to realize I
felt it was missing, that I’d cut myself off from it. Without it, I wasn’t
centered or balanced mentally, emotionally, or spiritually. Without it, I was
trying to hobble forward on one leg as if I still had two. In that light, it’s
really no wonder that I wasn’t getting very far.
The only reason I didn’t fall flat on my snout is that I was never really
alone. And, while that’s another story, how important it is to this one cannot
be understated. I say that because part of the realization came through those I
call friends and family, some of whom I’m connected to more via social media
than through in-person contact.
Yet now, as it reawakens, I feel more like the playful pup, more like the
person who knows he’s part of something greater than himself. I’m beginning to
feel centered again. I’ve actually begun to understand even better what being a
pup means to me. It’s not the sum total of who or what I am as a person; it’s
far more a part of my core that I realized, touching many aspects of my daily
life.
I appreciate better the nature of
that inner pup: a service Alpha pup. Maybe it’s odd that I would lose sight of
that. It’s where my journey as a pup began (well, not necessarily an alpha, but
definitely a service pup). By the same token, though, that nature has grown. In
the past, it was in service to my former Mister. Today, I’m a stray, but the
potential for fulfillment as a service pup is no less. In the past, I explored
my dominant side. Today, I’m learning that it was never about trying to
separate the pup and that dominant-oriented energy, but rather allowing it all
to meld together. Then and now, it wasn’t supposed to be about extremes, but
accepting it all as part of the whole package.
It’s been learning that, while in everything I do I try to give my best, the
best I have to give comes when I’m connected to and grounded by that inner pup.
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